NEW YORK, Nov 23 (NNN-AGENCIES) – There might be more COVID-19 cases between now and Jan, as holidays come one after another, and people tend to travel a lot to meet and celebrate, which is just one of the main reasons fuelling the spread of the pandemic, New York State Governor, Andrew Cuomo, warned yesterday.
“Between now and Jan, there will be increased social interaction, and the consequence, I believe, will be an increase in the rate of cases. The only question of how much and how fast is up to you,” Cuomo told a press conference, held in Albany, the capital city of the state.
“You can change what you do, and you can change how your community acts. We have several communities across the state in the warning track to yellow zones or become red or orange zones this week, while a vaccine is expected to come in Dec or Jan, we cannot let our guard down,” said the governor.
The vaccine will be first distributed for high-need populations, but it will be six months at a minimum, before it is widely available, so people simply cannot afford six months of a sustained increase in cases.
“The post-holiday increase is purely a function of what we do and New Yorkers have already proven their toughness, but as Thanksgiving and the holiday season approaches, we need to stay the course,” he added.
The governor said, New York ranked the fourth lowest state of COVID-19 positivity rate, with 2.90 percent on a seven-day average, after Vermont, Hawaii and Maine.
As of last night, the Centre for Systems Science and Engineering, at Johns Hopkins University, reported 34,319 deaths in NY State, the worst in the country.
Nationwide, more than 12.2 million cases have been recorded, with more than 256,000 related deaths as of last night, according to the real-time count kept by Johns Hopkins University. It took only six days for the country to add over one million infections, to a record high of 11 million cases on Nov 15.– NNN-AGENCIES
